Mexico sets its stance on childhood obesity

• April 19, 2024

The General Guidelines for Expenditures or Distribution of Food and Beverages in School Consumption Establishments of Basic Education Facilities , include the requirements for industrialized foods to promote among schoolchildren the concept of good nutrition. 15 countries have documents of this type, but only in 8, among them Mexico, is advanced, by prohibiting the sale of refreshments or of industrialized products that do not comply with the requirements, informed the Secretary of Federal Health, José Ángel Córdova Villalobos .

The person in charge of health in Mexico, said that the guidelines are nothing more than having smaller snacks and cakes and caloric intake, but offering different nutritional components that children can consume, but always in a moderate way.

However, he warned that it is important to promote good nutritional balance in prepared foods, which are the most consumed in schools, for which they have distributed 16 million menus, in order to teach parents how to eat in a balanced way

Córdova Villalobos pointed out that the objectives are to reverse the increase in overweight in children from two to five years old, because a little one with obesity it is very difficult to return to the condition of pre-obesity .

The second goal is to stabilize the growth of this problem in the population from 5 to 19 years, a group in which only physical exercise and having a nutritional balance can achieve the goal, and the third purpose is to slow down the increase of that problem in adults.

The Secretary of Federal Health insisted on the urgency of attending the obesity , since it leads to the development of chronic degenerative diseases , Like the cardiovascular diseases , diabetes Y Cancer , what forces to establish a punctual and forceful strategy to be able to restrain "This is the real pandemic of the 21st century" .

Food, he added, is a habit that is learned first at home and in schools, so it is up to the Ministries of Health and Education to modify and create a learning model that teaches children to eat properly and develop physical abilities. .

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